One of the biggest Oscar snubs in recent memory was Florence Pugh not getting nominated for her performance in Midsommar. I’m still mad about this. She should have been nominated for the panic attack scene alone, where the women of the Swedish commune surround her and mimic her wailing in collective grief. Heck, nominate them all.
On her Instagram, Pugh shared her memory of shooting the memorable scene. “I’ve been waiting for a long time to post this picture. I knew when I took it that I had captured a special moment/day between all of us,” she wrote. “This was THE scene. The scene which, all who were included knew exactly how many days there were until we shot it.” The Little Women star complimented Midsommar director Ari Aster for writing “exactly what we needed to do. We needed to grieve within under a minute.” She continued:
“I remember the first take being so long, much longer than is displayed in the film that you all watched. When Ari said cut, we all clung on to each other’s arms and dug our nails into each other’s palms and wept. Sobbed. Heaved. I remember it being really hard to stop.”
Pugh, who said that she has a hard time crying on camera (you wouldn’t know it watching the movie), took this photo “because I knew I probably wouldn’t see all these woman like this again. Even more worryingly, I may never work like this or see these women again.” But she’s thankful for the “beautiful, hard, proud hours” she spent with them.